Search results

This paper aims to the identification of journal articles that probably report on interdisciplinary research at Wageningen University & Research (WUR).

For identification of interdisciplinary research, an analysis is performed on journals from which articles have been cited in articles (co-)authored by WUR staff. The journals with cited articles are inventoried from the reference lists of the WUR articles. For each WUR article, a mean dissimilarity is calculated between the journal in which it has been published and the journals inventoried from the reference lists. Dissimilarities are derived from a large matrix with similarity values between journals, calculated from co-occurrence of these journals in the WUR articles’ reference lists.

For 21,191 WUR articles published between 2006 and 2015 in 2,535 journals mean dissimilarities have been calculated. The analysis shows that WUR articles with high mean dissimilarities often are published in multidisciplinary journals. Also, WUR articles with high mean dissimilarities are found in non-multidisciplinary (research field-specific) journals. For these articles (with high mean dissimilarities), this paper shows that citations are often made to more various research fields than for articles with lower mean dissimilarities.

Identification of articles reporting on interdisciplinary research may be important to WUR policy for strategic purposes or for the evaluation of researchers or groups. Also, this analysis enables to identify journals with high mean dissimilarities (due to WUR articles citing more various research fields). Identification of these journals with a more interdisciplinary scope can be important for collection management by the library.

The study aims to promote the use of qualitative methods in service research by investigating how these methods are reported in service journals, how the level of reporting has evolved and whether methodological reporting influences the downloads or citations received by qualitative articles.

Methodological reporting practices were identified through content analysis of 318 qualitative articles published in three major service research journals and comparison with prior methodological literature. Regression analysis was used to test how the level of methodological reporting influences article downloads and citations.

The study identifies 29 reporting practices related to 9 key methodological reporting areas. The overall level of methodological reporting in published qualitative articles has increased over time. While differences in the level of reporting between service journals persist, they are narrowing. The level of methodological reporting did not influence downloads or citations of qualitative articles.

Service scholars using qualitative methods should pay attention to methodological reporting as it can improve the chances of being published. Factors such as theoretical contributions are likely to have a greater influence on article impact than methodological reporting.

No prior study has explored methodological reporting practices across different qualitative methodologies or how reporting influences article impact. For authors, reviewers and editors, the study provides an inventory of reporting practices relevant for evaluating qualitative articles, which should lower barriers for qualitative methods in service research by providing practical guidelines on what to focus on when reporting and assessing qualitative research.

Supply chain management (SCM) research has contributed to the transition to a circular economy (CE). Still, confusions exist on the related terms, and no review has mapped out the development trends in the domain. This research clarifies the boundaries of the relevant concepts. Then, it conducts a comprehensive review of the circular SCM (CSCM) literature and identifies opportunities for future research.

Using relevant keywords, 1,130 journal articles published in December 31, 2021 were identified. Unlike the published reviews, which mainly relied on content analysis, this review uses bibliometric analysis tools, including citation analysis, co-citation analysis and cluster analysis. The review identifies general trends, influential researchers, high-impact publications, citation patterns and established and emergent research themes.

The extant CSCM literature includes five prominent clusters: (1) reverse channel optimization; (2) CSCM review and empirical studies; (3) closed-loop supply chain (CLSC) and consumers; (4) CLSC and inventory management and (5) CLSC and reverse logistics (RL). Significant research gaps exist in the use of secondary and longitudinal data, a wider range of theories, mixed-methods, multi-method, action research and behavioral experiment. The least researched topics include zero waste, industrial symbiosis, circular product design, sourcing and supply management and reuse.

This is the first bibliometric analysis-based literature review on CSCM. It clarifies the interrelated supply chain sustainability terms and thus reduces related confusion. It offers insights into the patterns in the CSCM literature and suggests important research directions.

This paper aims to review and critique the knowledge management (KM) literature within small and medium enterprises (SMEs), offers an overview of the state of research and outline a future research agenda.

Papers published in KM journals are analysed using a structured literature review methodology. The paper analyses 89 papers published in ten journals specialising in the field of KM.

KM within SMEs is a research area of growing importance. Findings show that literature on KM in SMEs is fragmented and dominated by unrelated research, with few comparative studies between countries and several countries receiving little attention. Additionally, different definitions of SMEs are used and different kinds of SMEs (e.g. micro, small and medium) are often treated as equivalent, making comparison almost impossible. The results show a failure to address the implications of findings for practitioners and policymakers, which risks relegating the KM research on SMEs to irrelevance.

The paper presents a comprehensive structured literature review of the articles published in KM journals. The paper’s findings can offer insights into future research avenues.

This paper aims to assess the quality of the case study based research approach as documented in articles published during the past 13 years, based on a synthesis of indicators for the quality criteria truth‐value, transferability, and traceability.

Content analysis of 134 case study‐based articles published in six leading logistics and supply chain management (SCM) journals between 1998 and 2010 is used to assess and evaluate the quality of the case study‐based research approach as documented in these publications.

This research provides an overview of the quality of the case study‐based research approach. Results show that the quality is generally low, supporting the ongoing, but empirically unsupported criticism on the quality of case study‐based research. The results also highlight which specific aspects authors and reviewers need to address to ensure high quality of the case study‐based research approach in published articles.

This study is limited to the analysis of published articles in six logistics and SCM journals. Further research should investigate different journals in logistics and other disciplines, and the relationship between the rigor of case study based research and its contribution to the field.

The findings give guidance to authors and reviewers in developing articles with a high‐quality case study‐based research approach and help reviewers and readers to evaluate the quality of the described approach.

The paper verifies the validity of ongoing claims for more rigor in case study‐based research and identifies areas of improvement.

The regulatory framework may be construed as the existence of supporting infrastructure that assists in control, direction/implementation of a proposed course of law, rule or action. The regulatory order is now more formalized, expert-driven, transparent, independent and pervasive across countries and sectors. As a result, regulatory reforms enable markets to function efficiently by providing a supportive environment for increased investment, private sector growth and market-led economic growth. This study aims to review previous literature for understanding the impact of sectoral regulatory framework on sectoral performance.

This paper has adopted a systematic literature review to understand dynamics between the sectoral regulatory framework and sectoral performance. While seven multidisciplinary databases were used to identify 51 research articles, the bibliometric research profiling was executed to broaden academic research.

The results are organized into three broad categories: research context, research area and research methods. The identified articles exhibited association with 12 distinct sectors/industries, with maximum articles belonging to telecom, energy and finance industries. The study has focused on evolution of regulatory studies, impact of regulatory framework on sectoral performance and commonality in regulatory studies. Among the 15 distinct research contexts identified in this systematic literature review (SLR), the highest mapping was registered (from 23 articles) by the research context “impact of regulatory framework on the sector–institutions, infrastructure and performance indicators.”

Public administration researchers are increasingly using mixed methods research approaches to add diverse and novel perspectives on wicked problems. The qualitative approach (grounded theory, action research, phenomenology and participant observations) is appropriate for understanding the native viewpoints of regulatory practitioners and reducing the gap between rigor and relevance.

The study addresses lack of systematic review of articles covering the impact of regulatory framework on sectoral performance encompassing all sectors by, inter alia, collating important bibliometric profiles of the identified articles.

Many literature reviews on project management (PM) research are limited to studies published only in PM journals but some reviews do expand their analysis on PM research published also in journals belonging to the management studies field. However, the authors found no previous literature reviews comparing the PM content in different sectors outside the management studies field. Therefore, the analysis and findings of PM content derived from the sector-specific engineering and technology-focused journals are new. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

The authors analyze PM content in nine different sectors, where each sector and its inherent research is connected to specific engineering, technological, or industry-related disciplines. The authors conduct an evidence-informed literature review on PM knowledge in the distinct literatures of these nine sectors. The period of analysis is 24 years from 1986-2009. The authors discuss potential consequences of the findings’ sector-specificity for future PM domain development.

The perspective on different origins of PM leads to a meta-level PM concept covering several different PM domains, each with its own sector specific and separated development path.

The literature analysis purposefully excluded PM journals and management studies, and the authors focused only on sector-specific engineering and technology-focused journals that represent knowledge and wisdom of different PM contents in nine sectors.

The findings have significant potential to contribute to scholarly discussion on the development of a universal PM theory. For applicability across sectors, the authors suggest a modular PM theory with different sector-specific modules for knowledge, concepts, and underlying assumptions.

Currently, this discussion has been mainly focused on theorizing concepts and approaches in management studies only. This study expands the understanding to engineering and technology-focused journals across nine industry sectors/domains.

This paper aims to illustrate how business ethics research is progressing in the tourism and hospitality (T/H) industries and suggest a research agenda.

This study applies bibliometric analysis to articles related to business ethics topics in the T/H fields published between 1995 and 2014 in six, nine and five leading hospitality-, tourism- and business ethics-oriented journals, respectively.

This study provides a broad view on business ethics research in the T/H fields based on leading authors, institutions, themes and methods used over the past two decades.

This study assesses the progress of business ethics research in the hospitality and tourism fields. Only articles published in select, prominent Social Sciences Citation Index journals were analyzed.

This analysis focuses on published articles related to business ethics in the T/H fields. As such, it facilitates researchers, academic scholars and professionals in contributing to the field more effectively and advancing scientific progress in the literature. It aids practitioners by evaluating the extent to which scholars have investigated key issues in the field.

This study is the first to utilize bibliometric analysis to assess business ethics research focusing on T/H activities published in leading tourism, hospitality and business ethics journals.

This study examines scholarly communications in the International Journal of Managing Projects in Business (IJMPB) and identifies the journal's leading trends from 2008 to 2019.

This study analyzed a sample of 522 articles published in the IJMPB since its inception in 2008 until 2019. A set of bibliometric measures was used in the study to identify publication trends, citation structures, leading authors, institutions and countries. Additionally, analysis of research methodologies, industrial sectors and research themes of the articles was carried out through a rigorous content analysis. To examine the changes in journal expansion over time, the duration of publications (from 2008 to 2019) was divided into three subperiods.

The study findings show that 793 authors from 370 institutions and 58 countries contributed to the journal during this period. In terms of contributions, Australia and the Scandinavian countries are at the top, while Asian and African countries occupy a lower position. Moreover, among authors, Derek H.T. Walker was found to be the most prolific, with the highest weighting score and number of articles. Similarly, RMIT University of Australia emerged as the most productive institution. The articles were predominantly case studies followed by mixed methods (i.e. both surveys and interviews are used for data collection). Most of the articles in the sample were related to project management in general. However, several articles reported on construction, information technology (IT) and manufacturing projects.

This study is useful for the researcher community to understand the journal's scientific productivity. Further, it will also help identify dominant topics in the field of project management.

This is the first comprehensive review article presenting a general overview of the journal's leading trends and researchers since its inception in 2008.

This paper aims to compare the nature of three different business and management education (BME) research streams (online/blended learning, entrepreneurship education and experiential learning), along with their citation sources to draw insights on their support and legitimacy bases, with lessons on improving such support and legitimacy for the streams and the wider BME research field.

The authors analyze the nature of three BME research streams and their citation sources through tests of differences across streams.

The three streams differ in research foci and approaches such as the use of managerial samples in experiential learning, quantitative studies in online/blended education and literature reviews in entrepreneurship education. They also differ in sources of legitimacy recognition and avenues for mobilization of support. The underlying literature development pattern of the experiential learning stream indicates a need for BME scholars to identify and build on each other’s work.

Identification of different research bases and key supporting literature in the different streams shows important core articles that are useful to build research in each stream.

Readers will understand the different research bases supporting the three research streams, along with their targeted audience and practice implications.

The discovery of different support bases for the three different streams helps identify the network of authors and relationships that have been built in each stream.

According to the authors’ knowledge, this paper is the first to uncover differences in nature and citation sources of the three continuously growing BME research streams with recommendations on ways to improve the support of the three streams.